Of course leave it up to Duff to come up with the next great idea in the baking world. A “we bake..you create” cake studio opened by none other than the master himself Duff Goldman. I had the opportunity to go here with my sister one day while visiting LA. It is located in West Hollywood and from my experience pretty easy to get into. While they do take reservations for parties, we were just a party of 2 and were able to walk in with only a 15 minute wait.

While I believe there are a bit too many choices, it really is a well thought out operation. Questions like “cake or cupcakes” “chocolate or vanilla” are followed with “buttercream or fondant”, “filling” “cream cheese”. And it goes on.

How it works:

You pick your pallate: cake or cupcakes (max. 2 people per cake)

You pick your flavors: cake, filling & icing

You pick you icing medium: fondant or buttermilk

Then you get to play! They deliver your pre-made cake within minutes along with a ball of fondant and/or your buttermilk icing. You then get to pick from a large variety of colors to dye your icing and start applying it to the cake. After the initial icing application is over you are left alone to create using your fondant, cookie cutters, 2 colors of icing in bags (you choose the colors), 2 choices of candy toppings, with extras to purchase if you like (airbrushing, edible glitter, more icing colors, etc).

This was a really fun Sunday afternoon time consumer for my sister and I who have a small interest in baking. I would recommend going in with some sort of idea or inspiration as we went in just wanting to have a good time and did not have the best of creations in the end. They do try and rush you a bit by giving you a two hour time frame, so make sure you have an idea going into it and you’ll be sure to have plenty of time to finish your creation.

We started with my favorite color pink and followed up with fun gold glitter and ended up with this birthday cake for our Aunt Chaille. I would give it a 5 on a 1-10 scale because the girl next to us had an amazing winter wonderland she was creating that blew us out of the water. We also had a 7 year old from the neighboring party picking our accent colors…so purple and orange they were. It was fun! Go by and try it next time you are looking for something to do. Also, they sell gift cards which make great gifts for the kids in your life.

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. And whether you are one of the “I hate this commercial holiday” people or have to pretend to like it because your sig-o cares, it’s coming and no one can stop it.

So buck up and order your special someone a box of their favorite Baked Sugar treats. Flowers are pricey and I deliver too so order today!

My first Christmas order, 10 dozen mini cupcakes and 7 dozen cookies. Here’s what I worked on last night and this morning. Don’t you think you should order some too? They have to be the cutest most original holiday gift out there! So for those of you that don’t know what to get the office, the boss, your PTO members, just call me and order a box of holiday cheer!

I hope you have your Baked Sugar orders in for this week. Halloween is coming up soon and this year’s Halloween spirit is bigger than ever. What are you going to be for this year’s all Hallow eve? I’m not saying, but I’m just saying that my costume might involve a little bit of Baked Sugar. Check out Baked Sugar’s Halloween Pumpkin & Ghost cookies. So far they have been a HIT!

Check out what I did on my Friday night. This was for a four, turning five-year old’s birthday party. He wanted spiders! So he got a spider man middle cake (ie red) as his mom was going to put a spider man candle in it, and then some spider cupcakes.

The black spiders are made using stencils and black sprinkles. The brownish ones are made using chocolate and upside down m&ms. Perfect for Halloween and a birthday party at the park!

Speaking of Halloween, what are you going to be? Bet you can’t guess what I am going to be! Also, have you placed your Halloween cookie and cupcake orders yet? Order them soon!

Tonight on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives Guy featured a local Houston favorite Niko Niko’s. This AMAZING Greek restaurant is known for many things, the gyro’s the line out the door, and now the Loukoumades.

Guy was amazed at the bite size Greek “donuts” if you will. Made of flour, sugar (amazingly less than I would assume), lemon juice and yeast these greek balls have to rise for about thirty minutes. While the dough was rising, Chef Dimitrios Fetokakis of Niko Niko’s moved on to the sauce which consisted of water, cinnamon, sugar and lemon juice. This was heated for about an hour and right before it was done a large amount of honey was added. When the dough was ready the chef used some really technical machine, probably only used to make Loukoumades (so don’t go out and get one today, probably too much money and useless to you) that dropped little dough balls into some scorching hot grease. As soon as they puffed up he transferred them to the bowl of honey sauce. After 30 seconds or so, and a sprinkle of powdered sugar, they are ready to eat. Guy bit in to find a lovely “pop” and the honey sauce on the inside! AMAZING.

Here is Guy’s recipe from the Food Network, and if you haven’t seen Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives you should check it out and of course go to Niko Niko’s ASAP. The lemon chicken and rice soup makes for a great lunch and the Loukoumades are cheap and clearly worth a try!

Honey Sauce:

Topping:

8 ounces sugar

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Directions

For the dough: Combine all the dough ingredients in large mixing bowl. Mix until well combined. Transfer the dough to another large oiled mixing bowl. Cover and let the rise until doubled in size, about 1 1/2 hours.

For the honey sauce: In medium pot, bring the water to a boil over medium heat and add the sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, and lemon juice. Simmer the mixture for 45 minutes, then add the honey and cook for 5 more minutes. Set aside until ready to use.

For the topping: Mix the sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl and reserve.

Heat a few inches of oil in a deep-fryer over high heat.

Use a tablespoon to form 1/2-inch diameter balls of dough.

Add the dough balls to the deep-fryer and fry until cooked through and golden brown. Remove from the oil and drain on paper towels. Transfer the fried dough balls to a serving platter. Drizzle with honey sauce and sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar.

This recipe was provided by professional chefs and has been scaled down from a bulk recipe provided by a restaurant. The Food Network Kitchens chefs have not tested this recipe, in the proportions indicated, and therefore, we cannot make any representation as to the results.